The Perks of Nature
by WriteChristineR
Summary: Luke manages to drag Lorelai along on a camping trip. Pure fluff. I'm talking cotton candy, here.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

A/N: This came out to be an awkward size. Too long for a oneshot, too short for a real chapter story. So I'm posting it as a... two-shot? The second part will be out shortly. It needs editing.

The Perks of Nature  
Part I

"I cannot believe you convinced me to do this." She got out of the truck and surveyed her surroundings. She sighed. "It's so… outside."

"That would be the point," he said, well-veiling his amusement.

"Well, what do we _do_?" she asked, looking at the trees for inspiration.

"Now? Now we set up," he said. He opened his truck's tailgate and pulled down a large box. He drew a large canvas roll from the box and laid it on the ground. "Help me put up the tent."

She stared at the canvas, shocked. "Tent? What are we going to do with _that_?" she asked, fearing the answer she already knew.

"We're going to sleep in it."

She picked up a corner of the tent critically. "It's fabric. How do we sleep in fabric?"

He rolled his eyes. "You sleep in fabric every night."

She sighed. "Well I know _that_, but usually there are more substantial materials, like brick and concrete, surrounding the fabric."

"It's unnecessary."

"_Unnecessary_? What if we get attacked by lions?"

"In Connecticut?"

"Tigers?"

"I doubt it."

"Bears?"

"Oh my."

"Fine. But if we do get attacked by lions, your little fabric house had better be enough to protect us."

He moved the canvas roll to the other side of the campsite and spread it out. The clang of metal on metal could be heard as it unrolled, and several long poles were revealed as the tent flattened. "Here," he said, throwing several poles off of the canvas onto the grass. "Help me get the poles off of the tent."

She gingerly picked up a pole and laid it next to the ones he had thrown. "What are these for?"

"They make the tent stand up."

"Oh." She considered the poles. "I thought it just… you know, stood up when you pitched it."

He couldn't help but smile a little in his exasperation. "It does stand up when you pitch it, but pitching it requires poles."

She nodded. "Oh. Well, then."

"Look." He slid a tent pole easily through one end of the tent fabric. "Now do that on your side."

"Do you really want to trust me with our shelter?"

"It's just for one night, Lorelai."

"Yes, but one night is all it takes. If I do this, our house will fall in on our heads while we sleep."

He rolled his eyes. "No, it won't."

"Yes, it will."

Luke sighed. He walked over to Lorelai and helped her slide the pole into the canvas.

She pushed him away. "Hey, stop! I'm not four."

He smiled. "You said you couldn't do it by yourself." He eased her over to the next pole. She relaxed and let him help her slide it into the base of the tent. He tried to connect two of the poles together and tripped over her leg. By the time he caught himself, they were both laughing.

"Smooth!" she giggled.

He laughed, but made no reply but to help her put together the rest of the base of the tent. He was the one doing most of the work, but each was enjoying the close company of the other, although neither said so.

After much longer than it would have taken Luke to set it up himself, but much less time than both would have liked, the tent was up. Luke stepped back, and Lorelai did with him. "So, it's done?" she asked.

"It's done," he confirmed. "You could go in if you wanted to."

"Can I?" she asked, eyes full of wonder at being able to enter something she helped to assemble.

He laughed. "Sure. Unzip it first." He motioned toward the zipper on the front of the tent.

"I know that," she said authoritatively.

"Are you sure you're not four?" Luke asked as she peered into the tent.

She removed her head from the tent, turned to look at Luke, and kissed him. "If I was four, would I have done that?" she asked when they pulled away.

Luke smiled. "Hopefully not."

"So, what now?"

"Well, there's more to set up."

"Like what?" Lorelai asked eagerly. "Anything as much fun as the tent?"

"Probably not. Next we need to build a fire and set up the sleeping bags."

"I don't do wood."

"Can _I_ say 'dirty'?"

"Nope. My job."

"Can you spread out a couple of sleeping bags in the tent, since you seem to have a thing for it?"

"Dirty!"

Luke sighed. "Now she says it."

She laughed. "Yes, I can set up the sleeping bags."

"Good. They're in the truck."

She climbed up into the bed of the truck and found the two bulky rolls of bedding. She rolled them out of the truck bed and jumped down to meet them.

When the tent was set up, Lorelai ventured back outside to meet Luke. She found that the fire ring had several strategically placed logs in it, and Luke was in the process of setting up two folding chairs.

"I didn't know there'd be chairs." Lorelai smiled, pleased at the development. "I assumed we'd be sitting on the ground, or on moss-covered logs or something."

"I figured if you were really going to sleep on the ground, the least I could do is let you sit in a chair."

"Good," she said. "So, what now?"

Luke looked around at the hazy sky. The sun hadn't yet set, but it soon would. "Let's take a walk," he suggested.

Lorelai looked down at her flip-flops. "Do I need to change my shoes?"

Luke shook his head. "We're not going far."

"Where _are_ we going?" she asked as he led her out of the campsite.

"Nowhere in particular," he insisted, "just around the campground."

She looked around, profoundly unfamiliar with her surroundings. They passed several campsites similar to their own, some inhabited by a single person, others populated by large families. Some people had bikes parked beside their cars, others stoves and grills for cooking, and still others had parked large RVs in their sites. "We should bring one of those next time we come here," Lorelai said, smiling wistfully at the thought of the relative comfort inside.

Luke rolled his eyes, a look of bitter resentment sweeping his face. "Defeats the purpose," he grumbled.

Lorelai smiled, almost excited. "Do I smell a rant?"

He continued as if he hadn't heard her. "If you're going to go camping, you might as well go camping. Why bother driving to a campground if you're going to sleep inside? If you want to sleep inside away from home, fine. Stay in a hotel! You don't need the fire pit, the trees or the lake. Leave that to the people that'll actually go outside and appreciate it. Don't gawk at it from the window. If all you're looking for is the view, buy a postcard!"

Lorelai giggled. "I don't know, it seems nice to me. You get to come out here without actually having to sleep on the ground."

Luke didn't give any sign that he'd heard her. "Next time?" he asked instead.

Lorelai was thrown off by the sudden shift in the conversation. "What?"

"You said 'next time'. You want to do this again." It wasn't a question.

She smiled. "Let's see how the sleeping on the ground part goes, and we'll take it from there." Slowly, she snaked her hand into the grasp of Luke's.

They walked past a playground, devoid of children. It seemed that they'd all had to go back to their campsites to eat dinner. Lorelai's stomach growled. There had to be some law against eating dinner after the sun went down. It wasn't dark yet, but by the time they got back she had full confidence that it would be.

They walked through a field of slightly unkempt grass until they got to the lake. There was a break in the trees, and the pinks, reds, oranges, and purples of the sunset were visible twice: in the sky and on the water. "We're here," Luke said softly.

"Pretty," Lorelai breathed. She took a step toward the water reflexively, as if to touch it.

Luke smiled. "I thought you might like it."

"I wish I had a camera," she mused. "Or… I don't know. Something."

Without a word, Luke leaned in and kissed her.

"That'll work," she pulled away just long enough to murmur.


	2. Part II

Part II

"Come here," he beckoned impatiently.

"No." She knew she was being stubborn, and she planned to continue.

"Why?" he demanded.

"I've learned through years of experience never to go near anything… fiery."

"I promise I won't let you do anything stupid."

"That's reassuring." Her voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Oh, come on. You did the tent thing."

"The tent thing wasn't… hot."

He raised his eyebrows. "Really? Because I kind of thought…"

She interrupted. "Okay, sexual comments my department."

"Sorry."

"What is _with_ you tonight, anyway? I think the me camping thing has totally thrown you off."

"Will you just come over here and hold this?" His features were contorted into his trademark annoyed-by-Lorelai-Gilmore face. It was completely different from, for example, his annoyed-by-Kirk-Gleason face, or his ever-popular annoyed-by-Taylor-Doose face. It was softer; less severe. Certainly there was something other than annoyance there. If you knew his face well, you could see it. While his eyebrows were scrunched and his mouth drawn, his eyes were almost smiling. There was a sparkle there that, even on the best day, couldn't be provoked by Taylor.

"Dirty!" she exclaimed in her classic high-pitched voice. But she took a step closer to the ring of flames. "If I catch on fire…" she warned.

"Stop, drop and roll," he deadpanned.

"Thanks, Smokey." She pushed a lock of her straightened hair away from her face.

"Look," he said, nodding pointedly at his hands, which gripped the wooden handles of two thin iron poles. "Hold here." She carefully placed her hands over his, and he repositioned so that his hands held hers in place. "There."

"I still can't believe there's pizza in there," she said, staring at the other end of the poles, which took the shape of a rectangular iron box.

"You saw me make it," he reminded her.

"I know, but I can't get my mind around it. Making pizza in a metal box is a little weird for me."

"It's pizza, isn't it? You like pizza. Plus, this is better than normal pizza."

"I'll believe it when I eat it."

He rotated the rods, turning the iron box. A fountain of sparks floated dangerously close to their faces.

"Hey!" Lorelai said, repositioning herself. "Warn me the next time you do that."

"Sorry. It's almost done."

"I'm happy to hear that, now that I almost had my face burned off."

"They're sparks. They're harmless."

"All it takes is one spark to catch a whole forest on fire, mister."

"Now who's Smokey?"

She rolled her eyes and tossed her head incredulously, causing her ponytail to swish into his face.

"Hey!"

She smirked. "Is that thing ready yet? I'm starving."

"Let's see," he said, motioning for her to back up.

She let go of the wooden handles and got out of the way.

He pulled the iron out of the coals and set it on a flat rock just outside the fire. His hand jumped back and forth, fiddling with the hot clasp that fastened one rod to the other until it opened. He lifted one handle, exposing something that resembled a grilled cheese sandwich. "It's ready," he declared.

"Great."

He picked up the pole again, walked over to the nearby picnic table and flipped the sandwich onto a paper plate. "I don't recommend eating it yet," he said as she took a bite.

"Ohmigod," she said through her mouthful of food.

He smirked. "Like it?"

She swallowed dramatically. "Hot!"

"Well, what did you expect? It just came out of the fire."

"I didn't expect it to burn out the whole inside of my mouth!"

He rolled his eyes. "I'm sure you'll be okay."

"My taste buds may be maimed forever."

"Thank God, maybe you'll actually like something that won't kill you."

"Shut up, you."

He assembled another sandwich in the pie iron as she sulked. "You can probably eat it now," he told her after he'd set it in the coals.

"How can I trust you after you tried to kill me?"

"I didn't try to kill you, I tried to warn you."

"Same difference." Still pouting, she took a bite.

He smiled. "Well?"

"It _is_ better than pizza," she confirmed.

"Didn't I tell you?"

"How was I to believe anything you said?"

"Have I proved myself trustworthy again?"

She took another bite. "Absolutely."

--

"Ew, hey! Yuck!" Lorelai flared her arms in front of her, trying futilely to fan the smoke out of her face.

Luke smirked. "You're supposed to say, 'I hate rabbits'."

Lorelai made a face. "Why? That's mean. What if you like rabbits?"

"I don't know, it's supposed to make the smoke go away."

Lorelai sighed, and then coughed from the smoke. "Ugh. Fine. I hate rabbits." She waited a moment for the smoke to disperse. It didn't. "It doesn't work."

"You have to say it like you mean it."

She rolled her eyes. "I hate rabbits!" She frowned. "It still doesn't work."

Luke laughed. "I didn't think it did."

Lorelai grumbled. "You're mean." She stood up and moved her chair closer to Luke. The smoke followed.

"Hey!" he laughed. "You knew it was gonna do that."

"And you knew that rabbit thing wasn't going to work."

"Fine, call it a draw."

The wind shifted and the smoke blew in another direction. They laughed.

--

"I must have eaten forty marshmallows," Lorelai complained. "Who knew they were so much better roasted over an actual campfire?"

"I can't believe you actually got me to eat one of those disgusting things," Luke grumbled.

"Not bad, right?"

"Not if you ignore the fact that it was gooey, disgusting, cavity-causing, and will probably singlehandedly knock a year off of my life."

"Just less time you have to live without me." She grinned.

They fell silent for a long moment, both staring into the flames. The warmth of the fire contrasted with the cool night air. The bright stars, a thousand tiny sparks, were framed by the treetops, creating a painting duplicable not even by the best of artists.

"God, this is nice," Lorelai breathed. "Is nature always this serene? I might have to give it another chance."

When Luke spoke it was in a tone so low that it was barely audible. "I knew you'd like it."

Lorelai could feel herself drifting out of consciousness, but she refused to close her eyes, unwilling to let the painting disappear. But she was so intently focused that she forgot to blink, and her eyes began to water. Unwillingly, she blinked it away, but when she reopened her eyes, she found that they seemed only to want to open halfway. Slowly but uncontrollably they slid closed. Much to her contentment, she found that the painting remained before them, burned into her subconscious.

--

She woke with a start. It took her a moment to get her bearings. She was inside the small red tent in a sleeping bag, Luke sleeping soundly beside her. Why had she woken up?

She heard a rustling that must have been coming from just outside the tent, the same noise that must have woken her up. She sat up and looked around, frowning. Then she screamed.

A pair of beady eyes looked at her from the corner of the tent. Evidently the noise hadn't come from outside of the tent. The raccoon seemed particularly interested in her cinnamon flavored toothpaste. It had managed to get the cap off, and looked almost comical holding the tube like a baby bottle.

Lorelai's scream had roused Luke. He sat up quickly. "Whasgoingon?"

"There's a raccoon!" Lorelai's reply came out somewhere between a whisper and a shriek.

Luke got to his knees, but didn't seem to know what to do after that. On impulse, he grabbed a pillow and tried to shoo the toothpaste burglar out.

Surprisingly, it worked. The raccoon left the same way it had come in, although likely with greater ease. Its teeth and claws had worked a hole in the fabric of the tent near Lorelai's feet.

"It made a hole in my tent," Luke complained.

Lorelai sighed. "What time is it?"

"I didn't bring a watch." Luke unzipped the tent and stuck his head out, then re-entered the tent, zipping it again. "It's gotta be three-thirty, four o'clock."

Lorelai groaned. "I'm never going back to sleep after that."

Luke nodded his agreement. "Should we make breakfast?"

Lorelai grinned seductively, although aware that Luke probably couldn't see her expression in the dark. "I have a better idea."

--

"Oh, come on. Admit it. Food tastes better outside."

Lorelai rolled her eyes. "Your food tastes better no matter where it's prepared or consumed."

"I would thank you if you weren't being disagreeable."

"I was woken up at thee-thirty in the morning by a raccoon eating my toothpaste. I deserve to be a little disagreeable."

"According to you, you always deserve to be a little disagreeable. And the raccoon thing didn't turn out so bad." Luke smirked.

Lorelai couldn't suppress her grin. "What is _that_ face? I've seen your 'I-got-lucky' face before, trust me, but it's not usually that… smug."

"You had a good time," he stated simply. He smiled, "Last night," he raised an eyebrow, "this morning," his face relaxed, "and now."

"Give me another pancake."

"Answer me this first," he said, jerking the pan away from her. "Would you do this again?"

She smiled. "Not anytime too soon. But let me fix your tent and buy some raccoon repellant and we'll see."

The smirk returned to his face. "So it wasn't as bad as you thought it would be?"

"Don't push your luck," she warned. "But no, it wasn't bad. Parts of it were… nice."

"But you're looking forward to sleeping in a bed tonight."

She laughed. "You have no idea."


End file.
